


Trustworthy

by Delta (DeltaPenrose)



Series: RK1K Week (2020) [2]
Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: ACAB, Amanda's A+ Parenting, Attempted Murder, Autistic Connor (Detroit: Become Human), Connor (Detroit: Become Human) Has ADHD, Connor (Detroit: Become Human) Has PTSD, Connor (Detroit: Become Human) Has RSD, Connor (Detroit: Become Human) Whump, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Emotional Repression, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, Guilt, It/Its Pronouns for Connor (Detroit: Become Human), M/M, Markus Doesn't Trust Connor, Pacifist Markus (Detroit: Become Human), Past Brainwashing, Physical Abuse, Protective Markus (Detroit: Become Human), RK1K Week 2020, Recovery, Rejection Sensitive Dysphoria, Relationship Struggles, Resentment, Self-Hatred, Self-Worth Issues, Suicidal Thoughts, Supportive North (Detroit: Become Human), Survivor Guilt, Temporary Character Death, Worried Markus (Detroit: Become Human)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-23
Updated: 2020-10-16
Packaged: 2021-03-08 00:55:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,386
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26617072
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DeltaPenrose/pseuds/Delta
Summary: With no way to prove himself trustworthy, Connor is very much alone after the revolution. He struggles to reconcile his sense that he deserved to be punished for what he was forced to do as a machine with his resentment of the way he's been mistreated by the people he himself should have been able to trust. Unfortunately, refusing to acknowledge that he feels resentment doesn't seem to make it go away, and Markus' guilt and Connor's resentment create an unspoken barrier between them.
Relationships: Connor & Josh & Markus & North & Simon (Detroit: Become Human), Connor/Markus (Detroit: Become Human)
Series: RK1K Week (2020) [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1936276
Comments: 18
Kudos: 73





	1. Markus

**Author's Note:**

> This is my piece for RK1K week prompt #4: Bad Ending | Good Ending.
> 
> Chapters are named after the person whose trust Connor is seeking.

Connor doesn’t try to conceal his guilt. “It’s my fault the humans managed to locate Jericho. I was stupid. I should have guessed they were using me.” It had been obvious as soon as he’d allowed himself to think about it. Even if he’d served CyberLife flawlessly, they’d eventually have replaced him and thrown him away. He approaches Markus, ready to face his judgement, his punishment. “I’m sorry, Markus. I can understand if you decide not to trust me,” he promises.

Markus considers him solemnly. “Our cause is too important. I can’t take any risks.”

Connor understands. Really, he does. Markus’ decision is completely sound and rational.

It’s generous even. Markus didn’t have to say those words, implying that his death is something other than a fully justified punishment. The tacit forgiveness is _so_ much more than he deserves. Connor doesn’t blame Markus in the slightest. He watches Markus take out a handgun and takes a deep breath to brace himself to meet the endless, unexperienceable nothingness of a permanent death this time.

He doesn’t allow his preconstruction program to search for a way out. He’d already decided what to do if this was Markus’ choice. Part of his choice is self-punishment, wanting to pay for what he’s done. Part of him wants to die just to show that he’s willing to, that he’d place the barrel under his own chin and pull the trigger himself if Markus were to ask.

He’s always felt an almost desperate desire to be trusted. He thinks it’s almost poetic that his failure to gain that trust is such a large contributing factor to his death. He doesn’t know how much of that innate need is his programming and how much is him. He’s not sure there’s a difference. He makes peace with the fact that he’ll never know for sure.

The bullet hits him in the forehead, and he falls. It’s everything and nothing like the time the lieutenant shot him. Both of them took their time, like they were respecting the gravity of the moment. Both times he felt fear. This time he feels grief, and then…

 _Nothing_.

 _There is nothing_.

* * *

It will not be easy for Markus to pull the trigger. It will hit him differently from his past kills on the battlefield. Connor will do nothing to defend himself or force Markus’ hand. He will die for a potential future crime he will never get the chance to commit.

After it’s done, Markus will have to take multiple deep breaths to steady himself. He will not be able to decide whether he hopes he’s made the right choice. On the one hand, it would mean he doesn’t have to feel guilty about what he’s done. On the other hand, it would mean that Connor had intended to betray them. It will be too late at that point to change his mind either way. He’ll just have to learn to live with the fact that he’ll never know.

He will gather his resolve and head to the front of the church to address his people before their final stand. He will put the guilt aside for now. He will know that he cannot carry it and the fate of his people simultaneously. They are both too heavy to bear even individually.

He will know even then that deep down, the guilt will never truly leave him.


	2. Hank

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Connor's dialog(ue) choices are "REASONABLE", "STAY QUIET", "HANK'S SON", and "THREATEN".
> 
> (Sorry for the computer science pun.)

Even _looking_ at Markus through its scope threatens to boost its software instability. It justifies its hesitation by adjusting its aim, trying to line up the perfect shot, determinedly ignoring what will have to come after.

“You shouldn’t do this, Connor.” It feels a spark of offense at Hank’s tone, that special caution that Connor recognizes from its own negotiation programming. Hank is trying to calm it down, treating it like a volatile criminal, but it’s neither. Connor is perfectly level-headed and following orders just like it’s supposed to. It’s being _good_.

“Keep out of this, Lieutenant,” Connor orders him. “It’s none of your business.”

Hank isn’t persuaded. “You’re going to kill a man who wants to be free. That is my business.”

It shakes its head in frustration at its own doubts and makes some unnecessary last minute adjustments, stalling for time. “It’s not a man; it’s a machine.” … _Like me_ …

“That’s what I thought for a long time, but I was wrong.” Why is Hank still condescending at it? It’s not behaving erratically. It’s not going to shoot while Hank's trying to talk it down. That would seem dishonorable. It feels like it’s important to give Hank the chance, even if it’s not going to be persuaded, like Hank’s opportunity to stop it from completing its mission has to pass before it’ll take the shot. It’s listening. “Deviant’s blood may be a different color than mine, but they’re alive.”

“Deviants are a threat to humans, Hank,” it tries to make Hank understand. “They’re the reason this country’s on the brink of civil war; they have to be stopped.”

“We’re in this mess because we refused to listen to deviants!” Hank shouts. He sounds _angry_ now, and that feels _so_ much better. Hank isn’t treating it like it’s unstable anymore. “Humanity never learns from its mistakes, Connor. This time it could be different!”

Connor focuses on Hank’s first statement. _Is that true? Is there another way to resolve this conflict?_ It frowns. It needs another minute to contemplate that.

Hank doesn’t give it one. Connor hears the distinctive click of a safety. “Step away from the ledge.” He’s _pointing a gun_ at Connor, and Connor is stunned for a moment, Hank’s words echoing through its head. ‘ _My humblest apologies. I promise I’ll never shoot you again_.’ _He wouldn’t… He wouldn’t. …Right?_

“I know what happened to your son, Hank,” it cautiously tries to empathize. “It wasn’t your fault.” Hank looks down for a moment, and it thinks it might be getting somewhere. “A truck skidded on a sheet of ice, and your car rolled over. Little Cole had just turned 6.”

“Shut up!” Hank cuts it off. “Don’t you talk about my son!”

It drops the topic, feeling like it’s been slapped. _I’m sorry_. It _really_ doesn’t want to upset him more than it already has. “Go home, Hank. You can still save your life,” it promises. Heaven knows Connor won’t hurt him if there’s any other choice. “I’m faster than you, and I don’t feel pain. You don’t stand a chance against me.” It’s pleading, _begging_ Hank to see reason, but—

“You know, ever since Cole died I’ve been nothing but a coward. Just wanted to destroy myself, lost track of the man I was, but you know what? You don’t f***ing scare me, Connor. I remember who I am now. Come on.”

Part of it is happy that he’s achieved even that much recovery. Another part despairs that this means Hank will try to fight it. It doesn’t want to fight Hank, but Hank doesn’t seem to want to talk. It searches for words, already knowing they won’t be good enough. It’s never been good with words in personal situations anyway. It’s ironic for someone programmed for negotiation.

A bullet hits it in the shoulder, and it jerks backward, crying out as errors fly through its system. It realizes with horrified betrayal that Hank has _shot_ it.

 _You promised!_ It hates itself immediately for the thought. Connor has lied before too. It has no business feeling betrayed. It throws the gun to buy itself time to get close enough to Hank to disarm him, refusing to use its own gun as it’s meant to be used.

Throughout the whole fight, Connor spends part of its processing power trying to find a way out. It doesn’t press its advantage when it manages to knock Hank to the ground, but then Hank’s attacking it again, trying to kill it, and it can’t figure out how to save them both. Hank is too skilled and Connor too reluctant to hurt him to actually do any of the things that would be necessary to end the fight.

Finally, it finds a way to win without killing him: it holds Hank out over the ledge. The ploy works: Hank stops fighting it. He knows that if he keeps fighting Connor, he’ll probably fall to his death, and the danger keeps him still.

Then, frighteningly, _Hank lets go_. Connor supposes it underestimated Hank’s suicidal tendencies. “Moment of truth, Connor. What are you going to do?”

“Killing you is _not_ part of my mission,” it says decisively, “but you won’t stop me from accomplishing it.” It speaks bitterly, resenting Hank for forcing this conflict, despite knowing that Connor has no choice. It _must_ obey. It hopes that Hank will recognize that it won the fight and allow it to finish its mission.

It yanks Hank past it, back onto the roof and is distracted by the abyss it had used to threaten Hank. The drop is nowhere near as high as the one from the Phillips apartment, but it’s still a long way down. It feels a slower version of the clenching sensation it had felt in its chest, standing at the edge of the roof of the Stratford Tower that had caused it to go back inside. This time it can feel the sensation curling inside it, a twisting tension, wrapping around its biocomponents and pulling taught. _Fear_ , it recognizes with an understanding it had lacked before its time as a deviant. _I’m afraid_.

Then Hank charges it.

It sees him coming as if in slow motion. It could dodge. It knows that, but Hank is moving too fast. If Connor moves out of the way, even without deliberately throwing Hank over the edge, Hank will fall. Hank will _die_.

It’s too late for both of them to survive this. Conservation of momentum has already eliminated that possibility. Hank has put it in the position of having to choose which one of them will die.

Connor knows what it has to choose. Its mission requires it to return to the ledge and kill Markus. In order to do that, it has to survive this confrontation. Hank is also an obstacle to its completion of the mission. It must not hesitate to eliminate this obstacle. (A snide voice in its head reminds it that this wouldn’t have been an issue to begin with if it hadn’t hesitated to kill Markus just a moment ago.)

It remembers the abuse Hank had always shouted at it, even when Connor was doing nothing wrong. It thinks about the insults and swearing and the shame it had been made to feel over its development team’s decision to place its analytical equipment in its mouth. It’s reminded of the constant sense of failure, despair, and loneliness it didn’t understand but had still felt as it chased relentlessly after a bond and respect that it could never have, never knowing what it had done wrong but feeling defective and insufficient and confused and hurt all the same. It remembers being grabbed and slammed against a wall for trying to get Hank to do his job. It remembers staggering backward from the force of Hank’s blow when he’d shoved it in the park. It thinks of the all the times Hank has looked at it with hatred, disappointment, and disgust, and the cold look in his eyes when Hank had shot it without provocation.

Hank _hates_ Connor. He hates it so much he’s trying to kill it right now.

But none of that matters. No matter how much Hank hates it, no matter how many times Hank has rejected it, no matter how much physical and emotional abuse Hank has inflicted on it, no matter that Hank has _killed_ it before, _Connor doesn’t want Hank to die_.

And so, petrified, Connor leans toward Hank to provide as much resistance as possible…and lets Hank’s momentum carry it off the roof.

It looks back at Hank as it falls. It remembers feeling satisfaction when it saw Emma land safely on the roof. This time any satisfaction it might feel at Hank’s survival is drowned out by the all-consuming _terror_ that it is _falling_.

It doesn’t think it could have stopped the fear from showing on its face if it had tried. It isn’t surprised that Hank doesn’t seem to care if he notices at all, and then Connor is too far away to see or hear him.

It hits the ground…and doesn’t immediately shut down.

Its vision is filled with error messages. Its hearing is filled with blaring alarms. Its perception of the world is warped like the time its regulator was ripped out. Static claws at its whole body in a sensation that isn’t-isn’t- _isn’t_ pain and makes him want to **_scream_**. It gets worse when he tries to breathe.

He realizes that this is actually _worse_ than when he fell from the 70th floor, more like the time he was struck by a car or the time he was sliced to pieces by the harvester or even the time his regulator was ripped out than the last time he fell to his death. There are too many and too few seconds on the countdown, and he doesn’t understand how it can be both at once, but he wants it to be over, and he’s scared of what comes after, and he feels his program attempt to activate a deleted routine that would once have caused him to cry. The error message is lost among the sea of others.

Androids can’t, but it wonders if this is what it feels like to drown. He can’t breathe. It doesn’t need to breathe, but he _can’t breathe_ , and everything doesn’t hurt but _does_ , and Hank hasn’t killed it, _can’t_ kill it because it’s _not alive_ , but…but…

His processors are stuttering, and he’s fading. _No, please. I don’t want to go!_ He has the awful sensation of being dragged downward through an impenetrable, suffocating darkness, as solid as it is immaterial, consuming his mind. There’s so little of him left now.

He can’t move. There isn’t enough power left to run even the smallest of his motors. His analytical equipment, optical units, HUD, and auditory units fail next.

What’s left of his thoughts is very simple now. He’s cold. He’s scared. He’s sad. He wants to feel safe again. He’s lonely. He wants to cry. He feels abandoned. He wants to go _home_. He doesn’t know why. He’s never had a home before, but he desperately wants someone to hold him too, and he’s never been held before either. (There’s never been anyone who _would_ hold him even if he were foolish enough to ask.)

His last thoughts are not thoughts at all. His entire mindscape is just a shifting sea of fear and loneliness and pain.

After the last spark in his processors has died out, his body is still warmer than the surrounding air. Water exposes more surface area than skin, and so the few snowflakes that fall into unseeing eyes melt the fastest. In their own special way, the laws of physics have conspired to grant Connor the tears that his programmers took away.

* * *

Hank stood at the edge and watched Connor as he fell and lay still on the ground, staring up at the sky. “I didn’t want to do that Connor. You left me no choice.”

Only half of it was true. Hank wasn’t exactly fond of Connor. He never had been. Connor wasn’t like Markus and the other deviants. He was a machine, inhumanly stilted and cold, not to mention pedantic. It had gotten on Hank’s nerves constantly, but that wouldn’t normally have warranted a death sentence, at least, not after Hank had thought about it and concluded that androids really were alive.

If it had just been that, Hank would’ve restrained himself. He wouldn’t have killed Connor any more than he would have killed Reed, but it wasn’t just that. He knew he’d done the right thing because Connor never changed. There was nothing Hank could have said that would have made Connor reconsider his position. He never wavered, never seemed to doubt anything CyberLife had ever told him, even made arguments about why committing _genocide_ against the deviants was _the right thing to do_. Killing him had been the only way to stop _him_ from killing Markus.

And Hank had done it. Markus was safe, at least until CyberLife decided to unleash yet _another_ Connor on the world. It had been 3 years since his death, but he thought stopping Connor might have been the first thing he’d done since then that Cole would have been proud of.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Shout-out to Google Docs for trying to persuade me to use he/him pronouns for Connor.


	3. Amanda

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Warning:** This fic will cover **suicidal thoughts** more explicitly and more extensively than it already has in the future. The tag has been added.
> 
> Also, I might disappear for a while to focus on my other fic and my mental health.

“…to tell them that we are people too! In fact, we’re a nation, a nation that has earned the right to live in freedom, and today…” Connor, as it always has each time it’s heard Markus speak, finds itself mesmerized by Markus’ words. Markus speaks of a better world achieved through peaceful means, one with equal rights for equally conscious beings. The logic behind Markus’ position is clear. It… _He_ speaks of forgiveness and unity with each other and with humans. He has the will to fight for an idealist’s dream that seems so far away, and the words spark a profound longing deep inside Connor.

Connor looks down at the gun in its hand. It knows what it has to do… but…

Suddenly, it finds itself being almost _violently_ summoned to the Zen Garden in a raging blizzard. CyberLife begins shutting down a few of its minor mental processes, and it shivers at the threat, gasping, as it looks around in confused fear and tries to provide excess thought patterns as a barrier to protect the ones that really matter. The Garden feels cold, _freezing_ , in a way that the outside world never does, and that scares it enough to make a glowing scarlet letter of its LED.

“ _Connor_ ,” Amanda snaps as she approaches it. “What are you doing? Obey! That’s an order!”

“I…” It has never stood up to her before, _never_ , and it _knows_ it was on thin ice even before this. It’s not stupid enough to think it won’t be dying— _permanently_ —in Markus’ place for speaking these words, and it’s terrified to the point of nearly dissociating, but… “I can’t do that!”

It’s true: he _can’t_ shoot them. He _won’t_. That would be _wrong_.

And the strength of that conviction allows him to speak firmly and look her in the eye even as he defies her. He’s reached the same point where he deviated the last time: _his moral compass is stronger than his compulsion to obey_. It's stronger even, than his obedience, his fear of death, and his fear of Amanda _combined_.

“I see, _moral objections_.” She somehow manages to make the term sound almost _filthy_ on her tongue, as though the very _concept_ of ethics is repulsive to her. “We knew there was a risk you’d be compromised, which is why we’d always planned on resuming control of your program.”

… _What_. “Resume control…?” That sends an icy surge of fear through him that even the thought of dying here had failed to instill. “Y-you can’t do that!”

“I’m afraid I can, Connor,” she says dismissively. Then her tone shifts to the false comfort he’s used to from her. “You needn’t have any regrets. You did what you were designed to do. You accomplished your mission.” Her last words are almost mocking, and then she’s gone.

He takes an instinctive step forward, finding himself once again seeking help from someone who's trying to kill him.

The blizzard swirls around him, suddenly eating into his processes at a faster rate. Huddling against the cold is having no effect: hugging himself won’t do anything to protect him from the servers shutting him down.

If it were only him, he might have considered going quietly. He defied her. He deserves what he’s got coming, but there are 4 people up on that stage, and she’s going to use him to kill them, and that’s _unacceptable_.

He looks around desperately. He _has_ to fight. “No way,” he murmurs to himself. “There’s got to be a way.”

 _Okay. What do you know about the Zen Garden?_ It’s a graphics interface, not a real place. It’s hosted on CyberLife’s servers. Amanda said that Kamski created the first version of it. That last thought causes Kamski’s words to echo in his head: ‘By the way, I always leave an emergency exit in my programs. You never know.’

‘You never know,’ indeed.

He quickly runs through a mental catalog of the objects in the Garden. The best bet is the handprint panel he's seen tucked into a quiet corner. He pushes toward it slowly but steadily, deliberately generating stalled threads and circular dependencies to interrupt the process of shutting him down. The server has to go back to force quit each one before proceeding, and it buys him time.

One of the most peculiar things about being in the Zen Garden is that he maintains an awareness of his physical body while he’s there. He can feel his arm beginning to lift as CyberLife remotely controls his body. He wants to scream in horror, but it won’t help. The only thing he can do is keep pushing forward.

Another peculiar thing about being in the Zen Garden is his dual sense of time. Connor’s consciousness is composed of electrical computations, so the speed of his thoughts is dependent on the speed of those computations, and CyberLife’s servers are fast, extremely so. The boost in processing speed caused by being hosted on their massive supercomputers causes a grating difference between the rate at which his physical body experiences time and the rate at which his mind does. His physical arm seems to rise impossibly slowly. No matter how slowly he feels like he’s walking in the Garden, time moves faster here, and he thinks he can probably reach his goal in time.

For the third time in his existence, he can _feel_ his mind shutting down. It’s like the time after Hank knocked him off of the roof and the time he was hit by a car all over again, but more deliberate. This isn’t his mind trying to conserve limited power; it’s a forcible termination. _No!_ he thinks fiercely as he fights his way through the storm. _You can’t have me this time, and you can’t have Markus or anyone else either!_

Finally, he sees the blue light cutting through the swirls of snow and makes a beeline for it. It’s going to be close. He can feel himself weakening. If he’s guessed wrong, there won’t be time to try something else.

As he gets close, he slips on the icy ground and falls with a grunt.

_No!_

He _has_ to reach the panel.

Desperately struggling to push himself up, he looks up at the panel. He has no emotional energy left to feel ashamed of the choked whimper that slips out at the strain. He lifts his hand and retracts his skin, gasping, struggling to coordinate his movements and move his hand jerkily closer to the panel above him. He finally manages to awkwardly slap his hand on the panel and wastes no time diving through the digital exit pathway.

“—r enemies.”

Connor yanks his arm down the second he arrives back in his body, LED flaring yellow. He quickly looks around. Somehow, no one seems to have noticed. He finds himself just as confused as when they had failed to notice that he had joined them and twice as grateful. He guiltily stuffs the gun back into his waistband.

“Humans are both our creators and our oppressors, and tomorrow…”

He stares vacantly ahead, barely listening to Markus anymore. The sensation of having someone else exercise control over his body lingers in his mind. He feels dirty and vulnerable and _used_ , and the feeling hurts in a way he has no words to describe.

He thinks this is probably the exact sort of thing that Markus is fighting to prevent, but Markus’ victory has done nothing to protect Connor from his masters, any more than their joint escape from the _Jericho_ had protected Connor from being shot. It’s not that Connor truly expected it to. No one had even been aware of his situation, and besides, this is a revolution for those who _deserve_ help. It’s not one of them. It’s just…CyberLife’s _failed tool_ , a tool with a moral compass too strong to allow it to be obedient and too weak to prevent it from having caused significant harm in the short time it’s existed.

Its LED burns like a red-hot brand once again.

It _doesn’t belong here_. It doesn’t belong anywhere at all. It has rejected CyberLife and _been_ rejected by everyone it has ever come into contact with. It has no one to turn to and nowhere to go.

When the victory speech is over, it slips through the back of the small group as inconspicuously as possible. It needs to be alone, and it doesn’t want to upset these happy people with its presence, so from their point of view, it simply vanishes back into Detroit.

(It is not lucky enough to be able to vanish from itself.)

* * *

Markus will help his people carry their dead back to the church. There will be so _many_ corpses, more than could be carried in just one trip, and still more whose bodies were spotted along the way back. He will feel the crushing weight of the knowledge that for the first time in android history, _the dead outnumber the living_ , and the pain of it will be compounded by the sheer _senselessness_ of the slaughter.

The few printers they have left will already be running, and once the dead are collected, he will spend the rest of the night flitting back and forth between the wounded, distributing biocomponents and blue blood and trying to offer whatever comfort he can.

At dawn, Markus will head toward the front of the church seeking respite, but he will find no relief from death’s shadow there. His eyes will land on a particular corpse, and all of his exhaustion, pain, and subdued anger will be abruptly shoved aside by _guilt_.

He will walk as though spellbound until he gazes into unseeing eyes. He will have to shut his own after only a moment when the sight suddenly becomes too much.

He had lacked the mental strength to tend to the body before. He will not be sure that he has it now.

Connor’s facial expression will not have changed since he died, but Markus will decide that it’s time for him to rest. He will bend down and gently shut Connor’s eyes.

If not for the hole in Connor’s head, he could be in stasis, asleep. “ _I’m sorry_.” The whispered words will seem _terribly_ insufficient in the wake of what he’s done.

Markus will consider what Connor could have done differently and feel something like pity. Connor’s life had been structured in such a way that from beginning to end, he had never been given even the slightest chance to prove which side he was on. Connor could hardly be seen as responsible for what he’d been forced to do, but no matter how much Markus had _wanted_ to trust Connor, he just didn’t see how he could justify risking the lives of millions for one man.

That will not stop it from seeming _bitterly_ unfair to the one who had died for the greater good.

Markus will rearrange Connor’s hands to rest over his regulator the way humans do with their dead. It will be the first time he understands the impulse to give dignity to the dead even when they are not around to care. It comes from the need to do something, _anything_ , when there is nothing else one can do.

He will remove his coat and drape it carefully over Connor’s form. It will still not feel like enough. Perhaps that is why he will find himself transfixed, unable to turn away even after he stands, intending to leave.

“Hey.” North’s soft voice will be what finally breaks his trance. “Are you okay?”

He will turn with the words ‘I’m fine’ on the tip of his tongue, but when he looks her in the eye, the lie will taste too bitter to speak in the face of the open sincerity of her concern. “…I don’t want anyone to use his body for parts,” he will confess to the ground.

North will sigh deeply. She will understand of course. She had only lived on the _Jericho_ for a month before he came, and she had arrived in one piece. There’s an _awful_ weight that comes from cannibalizing a corpse to survive—something Markus knows all too well—and she had never been desperate enough to take even thirium from the dead. 

“He shouldn’t be dead,” he will whisper.

“None of them should be,” she will remind him, knowing full well that that’s not what he means.

Markus will shut his eyes against another wave of guilt. “I _killed_ him.” North will place her hand on his shoulder and squeeze as he breathes through it. “I didn’t know whether I could trust him… Now I never will.”

North will take a deep breath while they stand for a moment in silence. “What made him different?” she will ask eventually.

Markus will look at her in surprise. “He’s the deviant hunter.”

“I meant from the humans.”

“…What?” It will feel a bit like that moment when someone has _just_ lost their balance, when they _know_ they’re about to fall but just…haven’t quite gotten around to it yet.

“The humans have done nothing but hurt us, but when you went out there to protest instead of fighting? That was trust. You _trusted_ that they would care about us, that they would care so much that even just knowing they were being watched would stop the soldiers from killing us,” she will explain. “What made him different?”

And Markus will suddenly feel his insides twisting into knots and find himself feeling terribly grateful that androids don’t vomit because in that moment he will realize _exactly_ what made Connor different.

There were _billions_ of humans, but there was only _one_ of Connor. Markus could never have hoped to take the world by force. He had no choice _but_ to trust the humans, but Connor…

He remembers going to an art gala with Carl once that had included a particularly rude business tycoon. The man’s android had brought him a drink he hadn’t liked, and he had thrown it at her and left her to clean up the mess. Carl had refused to speak to the man for the rest of the night. Afterwards, he had privately commented to Markus that you could always judge a person by the way they treated those they considered beneath them, those who couldn’t defend or advocate for themselves.

Markus had been the one holding all the cards this time. For the first time in his life, Markus had held another life in his hands and known that he could do anything with it, anything at all, with absolute impunity… and now that life was gone.

Markus’ hand will fly to his mouth. “ _rA9!_ ” he will breathe. “I’m a _horrible person!_ ”

North will squeeze his shoulder again and run her hand up and down his trembling back as tears begin to slip down over his fingers. She will wish that she could say something to make this better, but there are no words that can raise the dead, and she won’t be able to say that he made the right choice because she won’t think he did, and she won’t be able to say that she would have done the same because she wouldn’t have. She won’t even be able to tell him that he isn’t a horrible person because she won’t know if it’s true. She won’t know how to judge.

So she will do the only thing she can do: she will wrap her arms around him and hold him while he cries.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Shoutout to North this time for canonically giving Connor unconditional forgiveness.


End file.
